FILLIN' UP YOUR TOOLBOX: Ding ding! We've got our favorite edtech teacher and administrator tools for the week right here (as highlighted in our Instruct newsletter), as well as a special announcement: Check out our nifty new S’Cool Tools tag on the EdSurge site for the latest and greatest edtech tools. (And yes! Please share your favorites!) Our fave tools for the week are:
Free (for a limited time!): Like the idea of project-based learning but not the time-consuming task of grading student projects? Now Gradeable offers educators a way to grade and manage projects. Here’s a handy explanation of how to use its newest tool, a way to grade PBL projects. And psst, EdSurgents: Get free project tracking for the 2014-2015 school year by signing up with the code PBLSURGE before August 31.
Free: Counting quarters at a bake sale might be good math practice for your students but classroom funding and management often creates a headache for educators. ClassWallet offers teachers a way to track money for classroom needs, from collecting funds for field trips to buying school supplies directly from vendors within the app.
Free: Want to spice up the upcoming school year with some fresh lesson plans? Take a spin around OpenCurriculum, which boasts 5,000 free curricula for math. (English and science categories are coming soon, the site says). Borrow full lessons from another educator or mash up others’ ideas with your own LPs using OpenCurriculum’s editor. In programmer speak, this is like GitHub for education content, writes Anya Kamenetz at Fast Company.
Free: Looking for more teacher-recommended tools for school? Check out Teachers With Apps. Curated by special education teacher Jayne Clare and early childhood educator Anne Rachel, the site offers hundreds of apps, addressing areas from estimation to gardening. All are field-tested by students and teachers; many are free!
